OUR old friends the California Air Resources Board have come good once again with details of a new bike before it’s officially been launched. This time it’s the Ducati 1299 R Final Edition.
Still a week and a half from its official unveiling on 7th July, when it will be revealed at the Laguna Seca WSB round, there’s now not much that isn’t known about the bike. Its official price, power figure and name were leaked last week – it’s going to cost £34,995 and make 209bhp – and now we can confirm the capacity is 1285cc, the same as the 1299 Superleggera and the 1299 Panigale.
It’s not a big surprise, since the ‘1299’ in the name is a bit of a giveaway, but the fact the bike is called the 1299 ‘R’ suggested it could be a homologation machine like the current Panigale R. In the past, ‘R’ versions of Ducati’s superbikes have been the basis of the company’s racers, as with the current Panigale R, which uses a race-legal 1198cc V-twin. At 1285cc, the new 1299 R Final Edition can’t be used for race homologation, since its engine is too big.
Ducati has previously confirmed that despite the advent of the new V4 superbike next year, the Panigale will remain its 2018 WSB machine. The V4 is likely to take over racing duties in 2019, but next year’s racer will presumably remain based on the current, race-legal Panigale R rather than the Final Edition.
The emissions document also seems to show a miraculous improvement in the bike’s emissions levels compared to the 2017 1299 Panigale. Although these are American specs, so not necessarily comparable to European emissions limits, we know that the Final Edition will be Euro4-legal, where the existing 1299 Panigale is merely a Euro3-compliant machine.
In terms of bare figures, the 2018 emissions document shows the Final Edition will pump out 0.05g/km of hydrocarbons, down from 0.27g/km on the 2017 bike. The combined HC+NOx is down from 0.32g/km to 0.08g/km, while carbon monoxide drops from 5.9g/km to just 0.4g/km!
Weight for the new bike has already been confirmed at 190kg ready-to-ride, the same as the existing Panigale. The emissions document confirms this, giving an ‘EIM’ figure (estimated inertial mass – a number intended to represent the weight of the bike and a typical rider/luggage) of 280kg. That’s the same as was given for the 2017 Panigale, and 20kg more than the US-spec 1299 Superleggera.
